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This guide is designed to support teachers in aligning the LEARNZ Natural hazards virtual field trip with the goals, structure, and learning outcomes of The New Zealand Curriculum refresh. It outlines the key learning intentions, suggests cross-curricular links, and provides examples of teaching and learning opportunities that are meaningful, place-based, and action-oriented.
Learning objectives
The virtual field trip is designed to:
- increase understanding of Earth’s dynamic systems and how natural hazards occur
- explore the social and environmental impacts of natural disasters
- develop ākonga knowledge and skills to prepare for and respond to emergencies
- empower student-led inquiry and action.
Curriculum vision and values
This field trip supports the vision of The New Zealand Curriculum refresh by helping ākonga to:
- contribute confidently to communities that are informed and prepared
- value the whenua, understanding place-based risks and histories
- respect multiple knowledge systems, including mātauranga Māori and science
- act with care and responsibility toward themselves, others, and their environment.
Learning areas and achievement objectives
Science
Strand: Nature of science
Achievement aims:
- Participating and contributing
Levels 1–2: Explore and act on issues and questions that link their science learning to their daily living.
Levels 3–4: Use their growing science knowledge when considering issues of concern to them. - Investigating in science
Levels 1–2: Extend their experiences and personal explanations of the natural world through exploration, play, asking questions, and discussing simple models.
Levels 3–4: Ask questions, find evidence, explore simple models, and carry out appropriate investigations to develop simple explanations.
Strand: Planet Earth and beyond
- Earth systems
Levels 2–3: Appreciate that water, air, rocks and soil, and life forms make up our planet and recognise that these are also Earth’s resources.
Learning activities:
- Investigate how tectonic plates cause earthquakes and volcanoes.
- Compare scientific tools used to monitor hazard risks.
- Conduct simple models (for example, earthquake shake tables or erosion simulations).
- Analyse video interviews with scientists to understand risk prediction.
Social Sciences
Strands: Place and environment; Continuity and change; Identity, culture, and organisation
Achievement objectives:
Level 2
- Time and change affect people’s lives.
- Places influence people and people influence places.
Level 3
- People view and use places differently.
Level 4
- Understand that events have causes and effects.
- Formal and informal groups make decisions that impact communities.
- People participate individually and collectively in response to community challenges.
Learning activities:
- Create a hazard impact map of Aotearoa.
- Compare Māori and non-Māori responses to historical natural disasters.
- Interview whānau members about past disasters and community responses.
- Develop a class inquiry into local hazard risks and Civil Defence plans.
Health and Physical Education
Strand: Personal health and physical development
Students develop the knowledge, understandings, skills, and attitudes that they need in order to maintain and enhance their personal wellbeing and physical development.
- A3 Safety management
L2: Identify risk and use safe practices in a range of contexts.
L3: Identify risks and their causes and describe safe practices to manage these.
L4: Access and use information to make and action safe choices in a range of contexts.
L5: Investigate and practise safety procedures and strategies to manage risk situations.
Strand: Healthy communities and environments
Students contribute to healthy communities and environments by taking responsible and critical action.
- D1 Societal attitudes and values
L2: Explore how people’s attitudes, values, and actions contribute to healthy physical and social environments.
L3: Identify how health care and physical activity practices are influenced by community and environmental factors.
Learning activities:
- Plan and practise school emergency drills.
- Create personal or whānau emergency kits and plans.
- Reflect on how to stay calm and help others during emergencies.
- Role-play scenarios involving risk and decision-making.
English: Phase 2 – Years 4–6
- Understand: Literature, language, and texts express, influence, and explore perspectives and ideas | Kei ngā mātatuhi, kei te reo, kei ngā tuhinga hoki te whakaahuatanga o te mana tangata, mana rōpū
- Know: Ideas within, across, and beyond texts | Ngā aria
- Do: Comprehending and creating texts | Te whakamahi rautaki ki te whai māramatanga
Learning activities:
- Write a news article or report on a natural hazard event.
- Present a video journal from the perspective of someone affected by a disaster.
- Design infographics or public service announcements about being prepared.
Mātauranga Māori integration
Focus concepts: Whakapapa o te whenua, kaitiakitanga, mātauranga ā-iwi
Learning outcomes:
- Understand Māori perspectives on the land, signs of natural change, and ancestral stories.
- Learn how iwi and hapū prepare for and respond to natural hazards.
Learning activities:
- Explore local pūrākau about natural events or landmarks.
- Compare local iwi knowledge with scientific predictions.
- Create a visual story (poster, animation, or mural) of how mātauranga Māori informs hazard awareness.
Resources
Useful links
NHC Toka Tū Ake | Museum and schools programme
Part of EQC's outreach work is to help raise hazard-aware Kiwis and support the understanding of natural forces that have shaped the land.
NHC | Natural hazards portal
Find out about natural hazard risk in Aotearoa New Zealand, and see how previous events have impacted a property by looking at past Natural Hazards Commission claims.
GNS Science Te Pū Ao | Natural hazards and risks | Ngā Matepā me ngā Tūraru ā Taiao
GNS Science has a national leadership role in monitoring and researching the causes, risks and consequences of geological hazards in Aotearoa New Zealand.
GeoNet
Check recent earthquake and volcano alert levels, as well as the date, time, and location of the latest earthquake.
Get Ready
Learn more about natural hazards in Aotearoa and how to prepare.
What's the Plan Stan?
A free resource to support schools, teachers and students to develop the knowledge and skills to prepare for emergency events.
New Zealand disasters
With thanks to Christchurch City Libraries:
Cyclones and floods
- Kopuawhara floods (Mahia Peninsula, 1938)
- Cyclone Giselle (New Zealand wide, 1968)
- Southland floods (1984)
- Cyclone Bola (East Coast, North Island, 1988)
Earthquakes, landslides and volcanoes
- Wellington earthquake (1855)
- Mount Tarawera eruption (1886)
- Murchison earthquake (West Coast, South Island, 1929)
- Hawke's Bay earthquake (1931)
- Inangahua earthquake (West Coast, South Island, 1968)
- Abbotsford landslide (Dunedin, 1979)
- Edgecombe earthquake (Bay of Plenty, 1987)
- Christchurch and Canterbury earthquakes
- NZ History | Timeline of New Zealand disasters
- Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa | Images of natural disasters
(Please check individual photos for reuse information.)
School Journal resources
- Idea City (PDF)
- Earthquake (PDF)
- Monsoon Flood (PDF)
- Quake, Rattle and Roll (PDF)
- A Silly Story (PDF)
- Low Tide (PDF)
- The Big Dig (PDF)
